Manitowoc, Wis. (SPECTRUM NEWS)- One of the most recent colleges to close, citing financial struggles related to COVID 19, is Holy Family College in Wisconsin.  

The Manitowoc institution has been around for 85 years and will close officially on August 29.  That date marks the end of the summer semester.

Under 50 students would have attended Holy Family this upcoming school year, as incoming freshman.  Clare Kelnhofer of Brandon is one of them.

“I fell in love with the campus and their math teacher really got me to go there,” the 17-year-old athlete says.  “I was also going to play basketball there and I had received a lot of scholarships to attend there.”

Clare’s mother, Tami, says it has been a tough couple of months.  Especially, for her daughter.

“They’ve lost their spring sports, their awards nights, their graduation excitement, even signing yearbooks and then you get this on top of it,” Tami says.  “How much more can kids takes?”

Holy Family College President Robert Callahan released a statement on the college's website, explaining why this decision had to be made.  

“The current trends in operating costs, the number of students signing up to continue at, or enroll in the college and private fundraising are the main reasons for this difficult financial position,” he says.  “The many significant financial impacts from COVID 19 have made an already tough situation unsustainable.”

Though he would not go into detail, he says the small, private school has had financial struggles for years.  

“In a little over two years since you welcomed me and my family into this special college community, everyone has been working very hard to achieve enrollment growth and increased fundraising,” Callahan says.  “Then, COVID 19 happened, wiping out much of that progress.”

Callahan says the workforce will be reduced on June 13.  

“Many schools have said please let your faculty and staff know we’re going to be hiring for some positions,” he says.

Callahan is confident all existing students will have another college to transfer to, their credits going with them.

“We had a small number of students who were depositing with us and we’re going to return those deposits no questions asked and were reaching out to those prospective students to let them know our admissions team is here to help them too.”

UW-Green Bay has already declared it will waive application fees for students from Holy Family College.

Clare is considering Lakeland University and Edgewood University, two other schools Holy Family is working with.  

The private college had 362 spring enrolled students this year.  The Kelnhofers are unsure whether Clare’s scholarship money from Holy Family will hold up at another school.